MAGA Republicans defend TikTok as 'conservative platform' as fate hangs in balance with Supreme Court

"Trump won the election because he listened to first-time voters like myself and joined TikTok to get his message to us directly," RNC Youth Advisory Council Chair Brilyn Hollyhand told Fox News Digital of the impending ban. "He didn't need paid influencers or cringey trends like his failed opponent. All he had to do was go where Gen Z was, TikTok, and lay out his plan."

If the Supreme Court does not halt the ban, U.S. TikTok users will no longer be able to download the app, and internet providers will be prohibited from allowing access to the site. 

The looming ban originated out of concern that American users' data is gathered by the Chinese government, but MAGA Republicans and content creators who spoke with Fox Digital balked at the reasoning as insincere. 

President-elect Donald Trump's supporters praising TikTok comes after the former and upcoming president made big inroads with Gen Z, especially young male voters, in the last cycle. A Fox News Voter Survey published after the election found that men aged 18-44 supported Trump at 53% compared to Vice President Kamala Harris at 45%. 

A Republican strategist told Fox News Digital that TikTok is by all intents and purposes a "conservative platform." 

"By all means, TikTok is a conservative platform now - if you take a look at how Trump dominated his competition, there's no argument against the value this platform has, and I don't think there's a world where Trump doesn't fulfill his promise to save it," the strategist said. 

The GOP insider added that "the fact that [Sen. Mitch] McConnell and [former Vice President Mike] Pence want to ban this thing means it needs to be saved." 

Ahead of the new year, Sen. Mitch McConnell filed an amicus brief with the Supreme Court, urging justices to reject ByteDance's request to delay the ban. 

"The topsy-turvy idea that TikTok has an expressive right to facilitate the CCP censorship regime is absurd," McConnell's counsel Michael A. Fragoso wrote in the friend of the court brief. "Would Congress have needed to allow Nikita Khrushchev to buy CBS and replace The Bing Crosby Show with Alexander Nevsky?" 

While former Vice President Mike Pence's nonprofit, Advancing American Freedom, filed a similar amicus brief with the U.S. Supreme Court last month. 

"The CCP does not respect free speech, either in China or in America. The First Amendment is not, and should not be read as, a means of granting the Chinese government the power to do what the American government could not: manipulate what Americans can say and hear," the group wrote.  

Advancing American Freedom President Tim Chapman told Fox News Digital that Trump's first administration "had this right the first time" when Trump initially worked to ban TikTok before the former and upcoming president reversed his opinion on the app. 

"The Trump administration had this right the first time when they planned to ban TikTok through executive authority for the very same concerns that exist today. Political strategists salivating over clicks and followers does not mean that the national security implications have changed," Chapman said. 

"The TikTok ban is controversial, I see two sides to it. I see it as an app that's very left leaning and consumes way too much of people's time but it is sometimes the only place I get info about stories that should be breaking world wide. At the same time it can be dangerous. It can radicalize young people. One day you wake up on TikTok and young Americans are saying they're supportive of Osama bin Laden," Wilson told Fox Digital. 

"It seems to be an app leaning towards being anti-American and brainwashing young kids. At the end of the day, if I say to ban it it's hypocritical against free speech. I just don't want it harming young people," she added. 

Trump himself has made a 180-degree turn on TikTok. Under his first administration, in 2020, Trump tried to ban the app from the U.S. market over national security concerns. His executive order, however, was eventually blocked in federal court.

"President Donald J. Trump ('President Trump') is the 45th and soon to be the 47th President of the United States of America," the brief states. "On January 20, 2025, President Trump will assume responsibility for the United States' national security, foreign policy, and other vital executive functions." 

Fox News Digital's Brooke Singman, Paul Steinhauser and Morgan Phillips contributed to this report.